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Spam I Am

Regular readers of this blog might notice that I’ve recently set comments to moderate. That’s because, a couple of days ago, somebody spammed my little commenting system and added about 200 comments in the space of a couple of minutes. Fortunately, these weren’t gross-out comments or anything, just goofy little messages telling me what a great blog I had and what a nice person I was... and linking to their own dumb thing. Honestly, I don’t even know where the link went. I figured I’d better not encourage the whole thing by letting them see actual traffic coming from here. But it’s probably some lame sell-y thing where they’re trying to flog something no one wants or that they’re better off getting from their doctor. (What the hell is hoodia? Ker-iste. And I really don’t need or want a bigger anything.)

I have trouble with the whole spam thing. Not just because it’s irksome which, of course, it is. But because, most of the time, it seems so ridiculously pointless. I can't imagine anyone ever responds to some of the goofy stuff I get in e-mail, but someone must, right? Otherwise why would people keep doing it?

Some of it is more pointless than others. I don't know how many lotteries I’ve won or how many broads on their last legs want to leave all their millions to “a few select charities and you.” Like... whatever. Then there are the people trying hard to get all their bazillions of dollars out of whatever country they happen to be in. And all I have to do is give them my bank account number and they’ll fill ‘er up. (That’s good. As long as it’s not something silly, right?)

From my perspective, though, the most pointless spam of all are those with random words and no links. And they have subject lines like “Intelligent Sausage” and “Industrious Decay” and “Illustrative Democracy.” I mean, seriously, what is that? I’ve been told it’s just spammers keeping their mailing lists clean and seeing if the mail they send brings back a bounce, but that’s not even logical. Why would a spammer care if their mailing lists are clean or not? It isn’t like it costs more to send 40,000 than it does 400, unlike snail mail where every stamp sets you back a predetermined amount. So why fill our mailboxes with goofy, nonsensical stuff that we couldn’t even act on if we wanted to? Please tell me, ‘cause I’d really like to know. Of course, if you do, you’ll have to wait to see your comment until after I’ve approved it. Though, in this instance, it seems appropriate somehow.

Linda L. Richards is the editor and co-founder of January Magazine and a regular contributor to The Rap Sheet. She is the author of several book-length works of both fiction and non-fiction. A faculty member of the Simon Fraser University Summer Publishing Program, she maintains a busy lecture and festival schedule and enjoys working with new writers.
When she isn’t writing books, writing about books, teaching or reading, Richards enjoys hiking the wild beaches near her home, quite often thinking about her current work in progress.